December 15, 2021 thought for today, Living in worry invites death in a hurry. American Proverb

It is another of the whirl wind days. I think that is a natural happening during special holidays such as this. I started this day, after the virtual visits, on updates to the weekly bulletin, next I moved on to work from a phone call I got with a request to make an addition to the poinsettia memory and honor sheet. Moved on to the updates I had for the Christmas Eve bulletin. About a half hour later was an email adding a whole full page, front and back, list of song lyrics to become an additional shove to the Christmas bulletin. So there was no time for the updates I planned for the newsletter and for the packages I wanted to prepare for the grandchildren. 

Yesterday’s photo theme was titled “treat”. I reached back in my archives for this one. I’m not crazy about strawberries. But smothered in whipped cream it’s hard to beat.  

As I was finishing up on the last document, I got a call from my sister-in-law. We had a nice long talk. Several things came to light that helped with a situation I have been struggling with for some time. And I think we had a few minutes of new bonding, something we both seemed to need. 

It was time for me to leave to be the photographer for the delivery of canned goods we were getting from one of the elementary schools in our area. They have a food drive every year at this time and donate all the food to our food pantry. It was amazing how many people came to help unload the U-Haul van crammed full of canned goods. It took nearly an hour to unload. There must have been twenty volunteers counting six from the church going up and down the steps with boxes of food. Our visitors to food pantry in the next few months will have a larger selection of food to chose from. 

I took time when I got home to download a new book....I just finished Deadly Cross by James Patterson ....I downloaded Winter of the World by Ken Follett but found it was very long but very interesting. I decided to save it for another day when there isn’t so much on my plate so I returned it and downloaded The Racketeer by John Grisham instead. 

One of the two photo challenges for today is “green”. I was at church photographing a major event for our food pantry and so was on the alert for one of my shots for today. I found this one among all the food boxes and packages.

The word for today is letters. The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity. Walt Whitman.  More than kisses, letters mingle souls. John Donne.  Letters are among the most significant memorial a person can leave behind them. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.  Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed. Galileo Galilei.  Any one who chooses will set up for a literary critic, though he cannot tell us where he went to school, or how much time was spent in his education, and knows nothing about letters at all. Saint Basil.  Critics are sentinels in the grand army of letters, stationed at the corners of newspapers and reviews, to challenge every new author. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.  Without 'tis autumn, the wind beats on the pane With heavy drops, the leaves high upwards sweep. You take old letters from a crumpled heap, And in one hour have lived your life again. Mihai.  A person who can write a long letter with ease, cannot write ill. Jane Austen.  I have proved by actual trial that a letter, that takes an hour to write, takes only about 3 minutes to read! Lewis Carroll.  To know the laws is not to memorize their letter but to grasp their full force and meaning. Marcus Tullius Cicero.   

I found my second photo for today, “pattern” in the colorful tiles. I like the lines, shapes, and colors along with the pattern so it was a perfect and artful fit for the title. 

Here is an article that offers yet another way help comes from one to another. The title is linking “older foster kids with furniture (and).... ‘Feels like home’”. It starts out mentioning how seniors as they are downsizing find they have things they can or will no longer use and that those things can be more than welcome to teens “aging” out of foster care and can’t possibly afford all that they will need to start a new life. There is a Granville based business who has found they can help with the seniors they are presently helping by joining in a partnership with an organization for foster kids and families. Many of the items seniors give up through downsizing are given to the foster kids in need of help to start a new chapter. The helping organization is called Songbird Transitions and began in 2016. The seniors are helped in making their choices of the pieces of furniture that will fit in their new home. The goal is to make the new place feel “like home”. The organization helps set up the apartment even hanging artwork. They plan for safe space like room for walkers etc. Then they go back to the old place. There they “relocate what is left behind” by giving them to Fostering Further, begun in 2015, for the foster kids going out on their own. This organization also gives the foster kids aging out of the system welcome kits with cleaning and hygiene supplies.  Before the partnership with Songbird Transitions they purchased a few pieces here and there to help the kids. It used to be that all the kids had would be an air mattresses on the floor and a trash bag or duffel bag with their belongings. This newly formed system helps both the seniors know their treasured belonging that they had to leave behind have a new life and purpose as well as to help them bring a new beginning to the kids. 

I think it will be creamed dried beef for dinner tonight. 

Joy

cans and cracks